Whether or not Beth-soft has the money to produce an all spoken dialogue game while still maintaning all the content they set out to include does not change the fact that most endevours lead to corner cutting.

Beth-soft has the luxury of doing so because they hit it big with Morrowind. My fear is that smaller companies will see it as a neccessity with articles and responses like Gamespy's, and because they cannot afford such a extensive amount of voice, they decide to cut off pieces of their story, or simply drop entire sub-plots as a result.

Do gamers today lack imagination so much that they cannot use it and do what all humans do when they read books...hear the words in their head, assign their own perfect voices, and thoroughly ENJOY reading because it is fundamental to our intelligence and as I mentioned our imagination.

I'm not tottally against speech, I know it can sway emotions and instill awe when used appropriately, but I do not think RPG games are at a stage where they can afford to make such an investment. I'm not angry or dissapointed at ALL that Oblivion will be full speech, they have the resources to do so, and so more power to them. But to claim that having to read is a detriment to a game is just absurd.